The Multilateral Approach In Junkyard Wooing Theory
by museicalitea
Summary: Or the unexpected benefits of wreaking havoc in the junkyard and relocating to a mostly abandoned theatre, which is currently undergoing repairs by a reclusive cat. Whichever way, Tugger's intrigued (and a bit lost for words) and Asparagus is amused (and perhaps a little taken with the resident flirt).
1. Social Exchange

Disclaimer: CATS belongs to Andrew Lloyd Webber, the RUG and TS Eliot.

Note: Some brief swearing in this chapter.

* * *

><p><em>Some cats crave attention. They seek the limelight, whether it involves being stared at adoringly or delivered a long and highly exasperated lecture. They thrive on being noticed, and always seek company – for why spend time alone when it could be spent talking someone's ear off instead?<em>

_Some cats are rarely around. Even when they are around, no one quite notices their presence until they make themselves nearly as noticeable as the attention-seekers. They may simply be reclusive by nature, or they may have another purpose – to hide from stares and whispers that could judge them in the harshest way._

_Two of these individuals happened to find each other, once. It was a rather odd attraction, but then it was between two cats both rather odd in their own ways. One a bright-minded recluse, with dark deeds in his past; the other an attention seeker, who had seen death and felt oppressive despair an unfair number of times._

_This story is an exploration of theatre, and quasi-Scottish instruments, and a mane and a belt and a doppelgänger. It's also a very strange love story. In fact, it's so strange that one might even call it curious._

_Funny, that._

* * *

><p>"Look, I know I left you. I… I just didn't have time, you know that. I didn't <em>need<em> you, and I'd have lost you anyway, you know that too. I couldn't keep you with me back then, but it's different now. I… Can you work with me? Please? I just need you to cooperate, is that too much to ask? Please?"

There was silence. Tugger closed his eyes briefly, rubbing his forehead.

"What do you want me to do? I really don't want to force you, cos that's just not nice. I promise, I'll be better this time round, I swear. I just need you to work with me. _Please._"

His pleas were met with yet more silence. This time, he scowled.

"Why do you have to be so difficult?" he demanded. "I haven't done anything to you. I haven't – oh, come on!"

He gave the pile of junk in front of him a forceful shove that belied his slim arms and svelte chest. It shivered, but ultimately remained firm – and the bagpipes he had been trying to cajole out for the past hour remained stubbornly stuck in the middle of the pile.

"Dammit!" he yelled, kicking the pile for good measure. "When are you going to _work_ with me?"

His only answer was an unmoving set of homemade bagpipes and a mildly throbbing foot, neither of which did anything to improve his mood. Sighing, he leant forwards to rest his head against the upper reaches of the pile, gaze travelling down to the pipes of his unusual instrument. It shouldn't be this hard to extract one item from the mess – organised though it was – he called home.

He even had a legitimate reason for wanting to get his pipes out, unlike many of his short-lived musings. Unfortunately, the one cat he had sought out to aid him in his retrieval – once it had become apparent for the first time that the pipes were rather firmly stuck – had refused point blank to help him.

"Those things?" Munkustrap had said in disbelief. "Really?" Tugger had nodded fervently in response, which had caused Munkustrap to let out a very familiar sigh, followed by an equally familiar response. "Tugger, I don't have time right now. Get someone else to help you."

"I don't know where anyone else is!"

"Have you looked?"

"Looking wastes time!"

"So does chasing a lost cause. Stop bothering me, and do something about yourself!"

And so Tugger found himself in his current predicament. His preferred method for getting anyone or anything to cooperate with him was to sweet-talk them – either the cajoling would work in the intended way, or his subject of bothering would acquiesce and help him simply to get him to shut up. Unfortunately, his younger brother was one of the few the tactic did _not_ work on. Neither would Tugger seek out anyone else. Apart from not wanting the help of at least two-thirds of his fellow junkyard inhabitants on principle, he also wasn't sure where most of the other cats were, and like he'd said to Munkustrap, looking would just waste time.

(So did sweet-talking inanimate objects, but he wasn't going to admit that.)

Still staring at his bagpipes, it took several minutes of denial-filled stillness before he blew out his cheeks and pushed himself upright again. Crouching down, he gripped one of the visible pipes, and tensed his muscles. He pulled.

The bagpipes refused to budge.

"You kidding me?" Tugger muttered, redoubling his grip. He pushed himself up a little and shifted his feet back, bending his knees as he tugged. He could feel something giving as he pulled, and he pulled harder in response.

"Come on," he said eagerly. "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon…"

Another tug, and the bagpipes felt looser in their prison. Tugger began pulling in earnest, but his efforts seemed to be in vain; there seemed to be something blocking part of his instrument. His eyes widened as his lips compressed in irritation, and he gave another yank.

He managed to dislodge the bagpipes. However, the resulting force propelled him back such that he also managed to trip over his own feet. He landed heavily, still clutching the pipe as the rest of the instrument crashed down over his legs and a shout sounded out. Wind knocked out of him, he barely took in the rest of the junk pile collapsing and cascading over the path.

Wincing, he pushed himself up and clambered to his feet, picking up his bagpipes as he did so. As two of the pipes and part of the body of the instrument fell to the ground, however, he scowled, letting out several choice profanities.

"Language, Tugger," came an exasperated voice from behind him.

"Shut up," Tugger spat, lifting his bagpipes up to better inspect them. "I don't believe this," he continued to himself, as several tears in the fabric and a crack in one of the pipes became visible. "I don't effing –"

"Language, please?" the voice said again.

"Would you shut _up_, Munkustr – oh," Tugger said, turning around to see not a waspish younger brother, but a grimacing Asparagus, who was sitting on the pathway. "It's you."

"Yes, it's me, which you ought to know considering that you just fell on me and brought half the rubbish in here with you," Asparagus said mildly. "Swearing's good for pain relief, by the way, but only if it's _just_ for pain relief."

"Ah. Mm. Right," Tugger said, shifting his broken pipes into one arm and offering the other down to Asparagus, who took it to pull himself to his feet. "Sorry 'bout that. These were – dammit. Well, can't do much with 'em now."

"Sorry, what?" Asparagus asked, looking bewildered. "What _are_ those?" He indicated the broken bagpipes.

"Just something, it doesn't matter," Tugger said shortly. "They're broken now anyway, don't worry about them."

"Broken how?"

"Doesn't matter how!" Tugger snapped, letting the pipes fall from his arms. They hit the ground with a _crack_, and a look of sheer disbelief arose on his face. "_Shit!_"

"Language!" Asparagus shouted. "That's the _third_ –"

"Why do you _care_?"

"I – what do you mean, _why_ –"

But Asparagus's words were cut off as Tugger, having reached and exceeded his normal supply of patience, turned and upended half the nearest junk pile. The resulting avalanche of rubbish caused its neighbour to topple as well. And the one after that.

A full two minutes had passed by the time the last things had fallen and stopped rolling around, leaving half a dozen previously neat and stable piles of junk in a state of collapse and two toms staring in silence at the mess.

"Well, _shit_," Asparagus said finally.

"Straps is gonna kill me," Tugger moaned faintly, reaching down to pick up his damaged bagpipes. "He's going to kill me, then make me clean this up. And then I think he'll kill me again, oh _Bast_."

Asparagus raised his eyebrows at the chaos littering the ground. "How did you – that shouldn't even be possible," he said, gesturing to where the junk piles had stood two and a half minutes before.

"You haven't heard?" Tugger replied, smiling weakly as he clutched the bagpipes tighter. "I've got a bit of a knack for doing things I shouldn't."

Several seconds passed, and both toms continued to stare at the mess in front of them.

"I can see that," Asparagus said eventually.

"We'd better get out of here," Tugger said a few seconds later, looking up and around himself. "Straps can sense me causing havoc a mile off, and I don't think you'll want to be caught up in it."

"I wasn't the one who caused a landslide of rubbish and collapsed a half dozen junk piles by myself," Asparagus pointed out. He had started walking in the other direction, though, and with a brief glance back at the mess Tugger followed him, still holding the bagpipes.

"Fine, whatever," Tugger replied dismissively. "You know any good hiding places in here? I mean, I know most of 'em myself, but so does everyone, and I _know_ Plato's been dying to get back at me for that thing last week, and –"

"Why don't you come to the theatre with me?"

Tugger stopped, mouth slightly agape. "The _theatre_?"

Asparagus turned to face him and shrugged. "I'd be headed there anyway – and tell you what, I'll take a look at your thing," and here he gestured to the broken bagpipes, "while we're at it. Yes?"

Tugger's head was still buzzing in shock from the events of the past five minutes, and questions were spinning around in his mind faster than he liked. He had half a mind to stop Asparagus in his tracks and get him to explain some things to him. However, any pondering Tugger might have done on the offer or the other cat was out of the question as he heard a raised voice from behind them – Munkustrap's.

"Let's get out of here."

* * *

><p>Half a step behind Asparagus, Tugger found that for the first time in his life he couldn't think of a thing to say. Not for lack of trying, either; he had been mulling over "Cheers for saving my ass from Straps" and "So… you gonna be over at the junkyard again anytime soon?" versus "What up with the swearing thing?" and "What <em>were<em> you doing there anyway?" for the past quarter of an hour, and while they were all perfectly adequate stranger-conversation starters…

Asparagus wasn't really a stranger.

Tugger was thankful that Asparagus couldn't see him attempting and failing to talk – his mouth had opened and shut so many times in the past few minutes that he thought he probably looked a bit mad. He at least was able to hide it by walking behind the other tom – without any forced effort, much to his surprise. He'd never realised how tall Asparagus actually was.

It was only a minute or two later that Asparagus darted into an alleyway on their right, and by the time Tugger caught up to him, he had already opened the shabby looking door on the side of the building. Asparagus gestured Tugger in first, and pulled the door closed behind them both. It swung shut silently, and Tugger's eyes took a few seconds to adjust to the darkness.

Asparagus had bounded ahead of him, and was opening up a small cabinet affixed to the wall. It made several odd clicking sounds, and Tugger heard Asparagus heave an exasperated sigh. Within a minute, several lights had flickered on, and Tugger saw Asparagus half-smiling as he was bathed in yellow light.

"Electricity's pretty old," Asparagus said, gesturing for Tugger to follow him as he walked through a set of musty curtains and onto a black-floored stage. "I can't remember the last time it got fixed up properly, but it's on a generator thing out back, so I'm not complaining." He sat himself down on the stage, and after a moment's hesitation Tugger did the same.

"What's that got to do with anything?" he asked, not adding that he did not know what a generator was.

Asparagus gave him another half-smile. "Means the humans don't have to pay for electricity, I think, and so they're never around. Which is good, because I've replaced half that pulley system already," he said, pointing to something made of metal on the floor near the curtains, "_and_ I've been doing stuff with the lights up there, and I think they'd find that suspicious."

Not sure what to say to that – most of it having gone over his head as he stared around at the stage and the theatre sloping upwards from it – Tugger decided to change the subject.

"So… you said you'd look at my bagpipes?"

"Ah, yes!" Asparagus said, his eyes lighting up. "Let's have them."

Tugger passed the broken pipes over to Asparagus, who then proceeded to examine them very thoroughly over the next ten minutes. Tugger _assumed_ he was doing a thorough examination, at least – it was a bit hard to tell with all the sniffing and little gasps and mutterings he could hear.

At last, Asparagus looked up.

"I've got no idea how these work," he said cheerfully, and Tugger's shoulder's slumped. "I mean, I reckon I can fix them, it looks easy enough, but I don't know if they'll be any good unless you test –"

"You can fix them?" Tugger asked, leaning forwards with rapidly widening eyes. "You can fix them?"

Asparagus looked perplexed. "Well… yes. I can. I think so, anyway –"

But anything else he might have said was lost in Tugger springing up from the ground and tackling him into a hug.

"Thank you, _thank you,_ you're wonderful, you know that –"

"Yes, yes – I can't breathe, Tugger!"

* * *

><p><em>Author's note<em>

In my defence, it's in the video, in 'The Naming of Cats'. There is a moment in there where Tugger drapes himself over Asparagus, and it was too good an opportunity to pass up.

For those of you following _Fantasies_… it's coming. Slowly, but it's coming along. I do apologise for the wait.

Feedback's always appreciated.

~JV


	2. Socioemotional Selectivity

"WHAT? What do you _mean_, you're not coming?"

Tugger sighed heavily, and turned back to face Plato, who had stopped walking and looked crestfallen. "I mean that I'm not coming. I've got other stuff to do."

"But it's the Pollicles! Come on, Tugger, they haven't been scrapping for _ages_."

Tugger blinked, confused. "Plato, we saw them scrapping literally four days ago. That isn't ages."

Plato scowled at him, crossing his arms over his chest. "But this time I've convinced Admetus to come along. Him and all his Rumpus Cat-fan buddies. There will be a lot of us, and it'll make heckling the Pollicles _so_ much better." He raised his eyebrows at Tugger. "And I thought you wanted to avoid the junkyard today, anyways."

Tugger flitted his gaze around the street they were in, trying to work out if there were any shortcuts he could take. Plato's ramblings had mostly washed over his head, but he had caught the last part of what Plato had said, and searched for the briefest excuse he could think of. "I just want to stay away from Straps for a while, that's all."

Plato laughed, a manic gleam in his eyes. "Ooh, yeah, he was _spitting_ yesterday. Heard him ranting to Demeter or someone, said something about someone knocking down half the trash piles near the west exit. I checked it out after, and he was right. It was a mess. I don't even know why he was so wound up about it, Tug, it was absolutely _hilarious_. It'd take a _genius_ to make a wreck that size."

Tugger pursed his lips. "Yeah. That was me."

Plato, as he had expected, took it slightly the wrong way. "Nice one! Man, I think that's the most pissed I've seen Straps all year!" He punched Tugger amicably on the shoulder, grinning. "Damn, Tugger, how d'you do it?"

"Far too easily and frequently, I can assure you. I have to go."

Truth be told, Tugger did sometimes regret riling Munkustrap up so much. It wasn't his younger brother's fault that he was so easy to fluster and agitate. And yeah, okay, it was _loads_ of fun to mess with Munkustrap, but that didn't always make up for the stony silences or shouting matches that would make up the following days. It was at times like these that Tugger both appreciated having been skipped over for positions of responsibility and regretted it – because if _he_ were the Protector, Munkustrap would have had longer to enjoy his youth. And Munkustrap wouldn't feel like he had to act like a responsible adult twice his age nearly all the freaking time.

Tugger shuddered. He hadn't had nearly enough sleep the previous night (staying up to assure oneself that one was successfully avoiding Munkustrap did that to you), and introspection wasn't a good state for his sleep-deprived mind.

He glanced up at the sky – overcast, but not about to rain just yet – and continued on his way to Old Gus's theatre.

* * *

><p>When Tugger slipped in the side entrance, the first thing he noticed was that it was very dark. He contemplated searching around for the light switches, but thought better of it; a dark, unfamiliar corridor like this one could have any number of things lurking on the floor or the walls ready for him to trip over or bump into. Far better to seek out Asparagus and find out why the lights were off in the middle of the day, when he had assured Tugger he would be in the theatre.<p>

He pushed open the door to the side-of-stage area and wandered in. The lights weren't on here either, and this struck Tugger as being very odd. What did Asparagus _do_ with the lights off? Meditation? Animal sacrifice? Cry?

"Yo. Um. Asparagus? Asparagus?" he called, moving into the wings and onto the stage.

"Up here."

The voice came from above his head, and Tugger obligingly looked up towards the ceiling. A pair of legs was dangling from the row of stage lights adjacent to the catwalk – and _these_ ones were off too! – and as he followed them, he saw Asparagus perched up there, a paw raised in greeting.

"Sorry it's so dark in here, I'm messing with wires and electricity and stuff. Care to join me?"

Tugger looked up at him for a second more, then shrugged. "Sure. How do I get up… there?" He gestured vaguely towards the ceiling.

Asparagus had already turned back towards the lights. "Don't break anything."

"Okay, cool, wasn't planning to… How do I get up there?"

Asparagus sighed loudly and looked down at Tugger. "Thought you were supposed to be curious."

"I am! I'm asking you how I get up there!"

Asparagus looked incredulous. "Why do you even have a reputation? That's not curiosity, that's laziness!"

Tugger gaped at him. Laziness indeed. Since when had curiosity equated to having to figure everything out for oneself? "I'm asking you a question!"

"You're smart; figure it out yourself!"

When he was sure Asparagus wasn't looking at him, Tugger stuck his tongue out at the older cat. No, it wouldn't help him get up to the lights, but it gave him immense satisfaction, and that was nearly as good.

Now, to get up there.

* * *

><p>"Okay, I'm up here."<p>

"Took you long enough."

"You weren't exactly helpful," Tugger said, walking along the catwalk until he reached Asparagus. The other cat didn't so much as look up when Tugger plopped down next to him.

"There was a ladder literally two metres away from you."

"It's dark in here," Tugger protested. He wanted very much to turn away from Asparagus in a show of ignoring him, but had a feeling that would hinder rather than help his quest for attention. "_You_ turned the lights off, you know, you could have a little more sympathy for me."

"You are a cat, not a human," Asparagus said, still bent over something with a wrench. "You can see perfectly well in the dark; _you_ just happen to be singularly and unusually unobservant for a cat who's _supposed_ to be curious."

Tugger scowled. How many times was Asparagus going to bring up that – sometimes regrettably formed – aspect of his personality and hold it against him? "Shut up."

Asparagus rolled his eyes and placed his wrench very deliberately on the catwalk next to Tugger. He shifted around on the lighting rigging and drew his legs up towards his body, curling over one knee. "So… You're here why?"

"Bagpipes." As if that weren't obvious enough. Why else would he be up here on a perfectly nice day that he could otherwise have spent heckling Pollicles, or causing havoc, or finding new and creatively disruptive ways of acting contrarily?

Though, to be fair, this was pretty contrary for him.

"Right. Bagpipes. Okay, I've looked at them properly – they're cracked, but nothing's really shattered beyond repair and it shouldn't be too hard for me to fix them. You need them by any specific time?"

Tugger froze. He'd been all well and good with someone else fixing up the bagpipes for him – especially since he couldn't quite remember how he'd put them together in the first place. But getting interrogated on his planned use for them – well, he hadn't been expecting that.

"Ball," he said, very, very quietly.

Asparagus frowned. "Sorry, what was that?"

"I need 'em by the Ball."

"Why the Ball?"

Tugger gulped. He didn't want to answer. He _really_ didn't want to answer. And if it were anyone else – still, he never saw Asparagus round much anyway. He could just say it. Quickly. And then run off and never show his face in the theatre again. He took in a deep breath.

"SreallydumbbutImgonnaplaythemduringyouknowwhatnevermind –"

"Tugger! Stop mumbling!" Asparagus lifted his body straighter and emphasised his words with his paws. "Enunciate! Project!"

Tugger growled, hackles rising as his spine stiffened. "It's really fucking dumb, okay? I –" He felt his cheeks heat up, and he faltered. "I want to play them at the Ball. During Pekes and Pollicles."

"Oh." Asparagus relaxed down and nodded. "Cool."

That didn't sound like a taunt. "Wait, really?"

"Mm."

"Oh." Tugger let out a small huff of air, and slumped back against the rails of the catwalk. Asparagus had taken up a screwdriver and was back to fiddling with the stage lights. Relieved of attention for the moment, Tugger let the conversation play back in his mind. There had been nothing malicious in Asparagus's tone, nothing dripping in sarcasm or laced with teasing laughter. And then something struck him.

"Hang on a sec. You – you didn't…"

"Didn't what?" Asparagus looked up at him again.

"Yesterday you called me out like, six times –"

"Not six, don't exaggerate."

"– 'cause I was swearing. And I just swore then and you didn't say anything. What's that all about?"

"Oh." Asparagus's ears flattened against his head, and he suddenly seemed to be very interested in the stage floor. "Well. I mean, _I_ have nothing against it, not really, it's just, I, uh… Well, I've been, um, _discouraged_ to swear. To, uh, 'protect little kittens' innocent ears'." He looked briefly up at Tugger, a weak smile on his face.

Tugger raised an eyebrow, and Asparagus looked down again, fidgeting with his screwdriver. The tips of his ears had gone very red.

"By Aunt Lora. Um. Jellylorum."

Well, that explained a lot. "_Oh._"

"Mm. So, as you can imagine, due to my living in simultaneous awe and terror of her, common sense and fear have won out and I have adopted the habit of following her orders if she tells me to do or not do things, whatever the case happens to be, because otherwise I would spend most of my time fearing for my life, because I _know_ she knows at least eighteen different ways to murder someone and –"

"I'm getting lost, Asparagus."

Asparagus cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his head. "To put it shortly, I live in constant fear of Jellylorum's wrath, as do we all, so I don't take chances when she tells me not to swear in hearing range of my darling cousins."

"Cous – oh, Cettie and Victoria."

"Yep."

A pressing silence settled on the two of them. Asparagus bent over the lights with his screwdriver once more, ears still red, and Tugger lounged back against the struts on the catwalk, gazing out into the auditorium.

He had to admit, it was kind of weird looking over the auditorium from this viewpoint. He'd only ever really seen it for most of his life from in the seats – and that was on the very rare occasions he had ever come over. But there was something strangely comforting about looking out at the seats stretching out into the vast depths of the theatre from this height. It felt very safe, even as he shifted his weight and felt the catwalk sway a little beneath him.

Maybe it was the quiet. Aside from Asparagus tinkering away beside him, there was no sound in the theatre. Even the little clangings and clinks from Asparagus's screwdriver didn't echo much, muffled out by the heavy curtains and dusty upholstery. The space was big enough and the walls were thick enough that the noises from outside weren't even muffled; they were just non-existent. It could have been a world and a half away from the junkyard; miles and miles and miles away from the noise and the sunlight and everyone else _being_ there all the time.

And damn it if it wasn't kind of nice for a change.

"Say, Tugger?"

The noise was startling after such a lengthy silence, and it took Tugger several seconds to register that Asparagus was speaking to him. "Oh – what?"

"Where'd you get those bagpipes, anyway? Not something I've ever seen round the yard before, or in town, and there's nothing like them in the props box."

More questions about the bagpipes. Great. "Oh. Ah. I. Um. I… I kinda made them myself."

Asparagus looked ecstatic. "You did? Really?"

"They're not really that good," Tugger said, averting his eyes. "And I didn't exactly have a lot of stuff I could use for them, so they look a bit weird. And Bast knows how they sound, but –"

"Tugger, you're rambling."

Tugger smirked, raising an eyebrow at Asparagus. "That a bad thing?"

"I'm trying to not get myself electrocuted and you're distracting me, so yes."

Tugger shrugged and Asparagus turned back to his work once again. His next words were very quiet, and Tugger wasn't sure if he was meant to hear them or not. But the theatre was silent, and the acoustics were excellent – so it wasn't hard to hear Asparagus at all.

"They, uh… They look just fine to me."

* * *

><p>"Tugger! I – I wasn't expecting you round here today."<p>

Tugger gave Asparagus a smile and a half shrug. "Oh. I can… I can go if you want." He sat down on the steps of the theatre, where Asparagus was sunning himself (far from raining, the weather had cleared up remarkably yesterday, and Tugger was prepared to take full advantage of it). "I'm still avoiding Straps, and I thought you might like some help."

Asparagus smiled suddenly, and his eyes lit up. He looked absolutely delighted, like a kitten who had just gotten their favourite adult to agree to play with them. "That'd be nice, actually."

So Tugger stayed.


End file.
